


Crow & Butterfly

by BluebellWinter



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: But he's a very nice guy in this one, Despite the unrequited love it's a happy ending, I wrote a different verison of this fic but I need to finish it, It's Returned, M/M, Reggie has a brother in this, So don't write it off okay, Sort Of, The ending is abrupt and I like it that way, The first chapter is mostly an exploration of Reggie and his brother's brotherhood, The next chapter will focus on the unrequited-turned-requited love of Luke and Reggie, Unrequited Love, We die like my love for my father, don't come for me, somewhat proofread, take it or leave it, unlike the other one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-20
Packaged: 2021-03-21 19:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30026454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BluebellWinter/pseuds/BluebellWinter
Summary: Spencer walked in Reggie’s room.“What’s up?” asked Reggie.“They’re arguing again,” said Spencer, holding a book.“Good observation,” said Reggie sarcastically."How clever of you to sarcastically point out my observation just so you can be a smart-ass about it," replied Spencer.--Reggie has a brother named Spencer and this is a bit of an exploration over their brotherhood as they grow up together and make bonds with other people.
Relationships: Luke Patterson (Julie and The Phantoms)/Original Female Character(s), Luke Patterson/Reggie Peters (Julie and The Phantoms), Reggie Peters (Julie and The Phantoms) & Original Male Character(s), Reggie Peters/Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 20





	1. Crow & Butterfly

**Author's Note:**

> The band Soul Fragment is actually based off of the real band Ice Nine Kills.
> 
> It was inspired by the song The Crow & the Butterfly by Shinedown.

> “ _Just like a crow chasing the butterfly,  
> _ _Dandelions lost in the summer sky,  
> _ _When you and I were getting high as outer space…”_
> 
> The Crow & the Butterfly – Shinedown

They were six-years-old and running through their grandmother’s backyard. They were chasing after cicadas.

Their Aunt Opal had put some scary clown make-up on Reggie and had put make-up on Spencer that was from the movie _The Crow_ because Spencer loved that movie and wanted to look like Eric Draven. It was a movie that most likely wasn’t suitable for a six-year-old but Spencer for some reason had a fascination with horror.

Opal had taken a picture of them.

Opal was sitting on the patio, doing a cross-word puzzle and drinking iced tea. Every now and then she would look up at her nephews, to make sure one of them didn’t try to climb a tree and fall out. It’s happened before.

“Reggie, get off of your brother!” Opal called.

Reggie had somehow pushed Spencer face-down on the ground and was now sitting on his back. “I’m older! It’s my job!”

Opal set her puzzle book aside and got up. She forced Reggie off of Spencer, “You’re fired from it. Your job is to protect your brother while being older. Not cause him harm.”

“Fine,” Reggie grumbled. He started playing with the blue wristband that was supposed to signify him as ‘Reggie’. Spencer wore a red wristband, since they happened to look identical.

Spencer got up and their dad walked in the backyard, “Come on, you two, get packing.”

“What?” Opal asked, looking bewildered at the announcement.

“We’re moving to LA,” said Rob.

“Why?” asked Opal.

Rob heaved a sigh, not looking too happy, “It’s something for work.”

“Oh, okay,” said Opal.

“C’mon boys,” said Rob. “Start packing your things. And wipe that crap off your face. You look like a bunch of clowns.”

“That’s the point,” said Reggie trying to go for a creepy voice, but failing miserably. He took Spencer’s hand and walked into the house.

“Is it really work-related?” asked Opal.

“I don’t want my sons to live with a bunch of prostitutes, either,” said Rob. “Especially since Shannon’s mother wants them to refer to you as an aunt.”

Spencer whispered to Reggie, “What’s a prostitute?”

“Whores,” said Reggie. “I think I heard Dad say that.”

“Okay,” said Spencer, satisfied with that answer. (It took a few years for him to finally learn the difference.)

* * *

They were arguing again and a ten-year-old Reggie ran his hands through his hair. He really missed living in Texas with his grandmother. He didn’t get it. He looked at the time: it was 11:30 at night. God, why can’t they just stop?

Spencer walked in Reggie’s room.

“What’s up?” asked Reggie.

“They’re arguing again,” said Spencer, holding a book.

“Good observation,” said Reggie sarcastically.

"How clever of you to sarcastically point out my observation just so you can be a smart-ass about it," replied Spencer.

“Why don’t they get a divorce already?” asked Spencer.

“I don’t want to pay for child support!” yelled Rob.

“That answers your question,” said Reggie. “What are you reading?”

“ _Carrie_ ,” said Spencer looking at the book. “She’s way more of a sociopath in the book than the movie. It’s actually amazing.”

Reggie looked at his brother, “Okay?”

“What are you doing?” asked Spencer.

“Trying to sleep,” said Reggie.

“Good luck with that,” said Spencer.

* * *

They were eleven when the arguing got too much for Reggie. He prided himself on being the more emotional stronger twin, since Spencer needed him to be there, because the arguing still got to him. Granted, Spencer stopped crying when he was four, but still…Reggie was supposed to be the strong one, but something about this argument just upset him. Spencer found him hiding under the bed, which for some reason was Reggie’s go-to thing when he was upset. It wasn’t the first time Reggie hid under the bed when the arguing got too much.

So, when Spencer found him, he said, “I have something to cheer you up.”

“What?” asked Reggie.

Spencer picked up a plastic bag and took out white face powder, “You want to look like a scary clown again?”

Reggie couldn’t help but smile.

It took a bit for them to somehow put the make-up on as best as they could and tried to help each other fix it as best as possible, before just shrugging and going to the beach. They started running down the beach, laughing like they were six-years-old again, with the Crow chasing after the Clown.

Spencer grabbed a handful of sand and threw it at Reggie. Reggie laughed and threw sand back at him. They were laughing as they continued running down the beach, throwing sand at each other. It was fun until Reggie pushed Spencer it the water, then Spencer pulled Reggie into the water and tried putting Reggie in a headlock, still ankle deep in the water. Reggie put his arms around his ribs and managed to pull them down into the water.

It didn’t matter, because Spencer started laughing, which made Reggie laugh, and they were just splashing around and each other.

At sunset, they sat together on the docks, sand sticking to them and still damp from playing in the water.

It was silent and it was nice.

“I kissed Kyle,” said Spencer, referring to his friend.

Reggie was surprised to hear that. “What?”

“I-I thought I had a crush on him,” said Spencer.

“Did you?” asked Reggie, his mind still on overdrive over the bomb his brother just dropped on him.

“No,” said Spencer. “I didn’t like it.”

“Really?” asked Reggie.

“Like I didn’t really want to do it again,” said Spencer.

“I’m sorry that you didn’t like it,” said Reggie. “There’s plenty of time for you to figure out if you’re gay or bi.”

Spencer shrugged, “I guess…”

“Thanks for telling me,” said Reggie. He put his arm around his brother’s shoulder and gave him a squeeze.

Then Reggie pushed Spencer into the water, because Reggie loved his brother.

* * *

They were thirteen when Reggie confided in Spencer.

“Remember that day when you told me you kissed Kyle?” asked Reggie.

“Yeah, you pushed me off the dock,” said Spencer.

“I think I’m the bi one in this brotherhood,” said Reggie.

“You think?” asked Spencer. “How can you think you’re bi?”

“You thought you had a crush on Kyle,” said Reggie.

“Which turned out to not be a crush,” said Spencer. “Anyway, I’m glad that you’re figuring out this shit.”

“You have a way with words,” said Reggie.

“Thanks, dude,” Spencer replied. “I’m trying to write songs, so…”

* * *

They were fourteen when Reggie found something that he really _didn’t_ want to see.

He was looking in his parents’ closet for a reason that he forgot. He felt a box under some clothes and took it out. What he saw made him shriek in surprise and disgust. He yelled, "What the fuck?”

Spencer walked in, “What is it?”

Reggie showed Spencer the box, “Our mother wears nipple tassels.”

“Oh no, our parents have hate sex, get over it,” said Spencer.

“But she wears nipple tassels,” said Reggie, practically shoving the box in Spencer’s face.

Spencer smacked the box out of his face, “How bold of you to assume that Mom wears them. Have you seen Dad’s man-boobs?”

“ _No_! Why would I look at them?” asked Reggie. "Why are _you_ looking at them?

“I’m eye level with Dad’s man-boobs,” said Spencer.

“Why are you being so weird?” asked Reggie.

“How am I being weird? You’re the one freaking out over nipple tassels,” said Spencer.

“You’re the one talking about Dad’s boobs,” Reggie countered.

“It’s not my fault they’re right in my eyes,” Spencer pointed out. “It’s kind of hard to not notice.”

“You’re the one still going on about them,” said Reggie.

“You’re the one egging it on,” said Spencer. He turned and tried to leave the room but he walked in the doorway. “Since when was that there?”

* * *

Spencer started a band called Soul Fragment. Kyle was the co-vocalist, guitarist, and co-founder. Jason was the bassist, Joseph was the rhythm guitarist, Tyler was the drummer, and because Reggie felt obligated to, he was the second bassist. To not show favoritism, Jason was made the lead bassist, which Reggie thought was kind of silly to have, but he appreciated the effort.

They played metal-core, a genre that Reggie wasn’t really a fan of, but he _loved_ playing music, and enjoyed playing music with his brother. Reggie could see them getting popular, even though they were performing for like twenty people. At least they’re getting more audience members.

* * *

Reggie befriended three guys: Luke, Alex, and Bobby. The three of them were in their own band called Sunset Curve, they had a bassist, but they didn’t like him very much. They knew that Reggie was in Soul Fragment, but they didn’t care. They haven’t heard each play so there was that.

They also didn’t know that Spencer was Reggie’s brother, let alone _twin_ at that.

Reggie found it hilarious, considering how it seemed obvious. So, he and friends were sitting at a table during lunch when Spencer walked up to them holding a paper plate that had something on it, covered by Saran wrap.

“What’s up, Spence?” Reggie asked confused.

“We made cheesecake in cooking like two days ago, so we just got it today,” said Spencer, sitting down at the table, and wrapping the slice of cheesecake. There were two plastic forks so Reggie took the paper plate and one fork. He started cutting himself a bigger piece.

“Why do you get the bigger piece?” asked Spencer.

“I was in the womb first and I was born first,” said Reggie, referring to how they were a case of [superfetation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superfetation). “So I get the bigger piece. And you should’ve pre-cut it before handing it over to me.”

Reggie’s friends were strangely silent. Mostly because they were busy looking at Spencer.

“Guys this is my brother, Spencer," Reggie said, "Spencer, these are my friends Alex, Luke, and Bobby.”

Spencer nodded at them, which was good enough of a greeting for him.

The others nodded at him.

“So, you’re the lead singer of your band?” asked Luke.

“Yeah,” said Spencer. “I write the music too.”

“What music do you play?” asked Bobby.

“Metal-core,” responded Reggie and Spencer at the same time.

Reggie took the distraction and took the piece of cheesecake that Spencer hadn’t eaten yet.

“Hey!” exclaimed Spencer.

“You need to stop getting distracted when you have dessert near me,” said Reggie with a laugh.

“Asshole,” said Spencer. He unzipped his backpack and took out some papers, “Here’s _Me, Myself, and Hyde_. Don’t forget to let me and the others know when you change something.”

“Got it,” said Reggie. Spencer left the table and Reggie looked over the song.

Luke asked, “ _Me, Myself, and Hyde_?”

“It was inspired by _The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,_ ” said Reggie, sticking the song under the cover to his math book.

“How good is it?” asked Luke.

“I don’t know, I haven’t read it yet,” said Reggie. “Besides, I know that it’s going to be good.”

* * *

Reggie was fifteen-years-old and standing in the kitchen with Spencer.

Spencer had found a recipe on AllRecipes and was making chicken noodle soup. Reggie was doing some dishes. Reggie had found a poppy seed muffin recipe on the website and decided to make that too.

Spencer was wearing basketball shorts and a black shirt. Reggie held a towel after drying the dishes off and started twisting it around.

Then Reggie smacked the back of Spencer’s calf with the towel.

“Motherfucker!” yelled Spencer, grabbing at his calf.

Reggie just laughed.

Rob walked in the kitchen, looking at Spencer, “You bellowed for me?”

“No, Reggie hit me in the leg with the towel,” Spencer said, wincing.

“At least it didn’t have a bar of soap in it. That would’ve been so much worse,” said Rob.

“Did someone do that to you?” asked Reggie.

“No, it happened to someone I knew,” said Rob and left the kitchen.

“They asked me to join their band,” said Reggie, setting the towel aside.

“What?” asked Spencer, looking at Reggie.

“Apparently they showed up to our performance two weeks ago, when we had fake blood drop down on us for our debut of _Hell in the Hallways_ ,” said Reggie.

“That was when Jason was sick,” said Spencer.

Reggie nodded, “And they asked me to join Julie and the Phantoms." Sunset Curve had changed their name after Julie joined and they kicked out the bassist after he made unsavory comments towards her. "They said that it was okay if I didn’t want to join because you’re my brother, but…”

“You want to join them?” asked Spencer.

“If you want me to stay in Soul Fragment, then that’s fine,” said Reggie.

“If you want to join them, do it,” said Spencer. “They’re your friends and if they want you to be in their band, so go ahead. I know you don’t really like metal-core, so…”

“Thanks, man,” said Reggie feeling grateful for it.

“Even though you left this welt on my leg,” said Spencer, looking at it.

Reggie said, “Maybe you should start wearing pants more often.”

* * *

So, at seventeen, Reggie developed a crush on Luke, who was dating some girl named Rachel, who wore mid-riff baring shirts that had the bands that Luke loved.

Reggie didn’t know about Rachel, so when Reggie got the nerve to tell Luke his feelings for him (along with blind hope that Luke would return them) he walked in the studio to see Luke and Rachel making out, and his heart, along with his bravery was crushed and he went down to the beach, to wallow in his heartbreak and disappointment.

And just like last time, Spencer found him, and he held a paper bag that Reggie knew held cosmetics.

They went back home and Reggie put on the scary clown make-up, while Spencer put on _The Crow_ make-up, then Reggie decided to take a picture of their handiwork, so Spencer stood beside Reggie.

Reggie put his arm around Spencer’s shoulders, pulling him in and he flipped off the camera, and Spencer decided to the same, and Reggie took a picture. He set it as his phone wallpaper and they went outside.

And just like always, the Crow chased after the Clown.

The sun was setting when the brothers sat on the dock again. This time they didn’t end up in the ocean, so the make-up was, surprisingly, holding up.

Spencer asked, “Do you think I’m weird?”

“Yes,” said Reggie bluntly.

“Thanks, but I mean…” started Spencer, “I don’t want to date anyone.”

Reggie said, “So?”

“Okay,” said Spencer. “I accidentally walked in on Jason’s parents having a threesome. And I threw up afterwards.”

Reggie gave him a weird look, which was really off-putting considering the scary clown make-up. “That’s weird.”

“And I hate the thought of having my own spit in my own mouth, so I don’t really want someone else’s in my mouth," Spencer stated.

“And that’s why you don’t want to date anyone?” asked Reggie.

“No, I just don’t find anyone attractive,” said Spencer. “Sure I do find girls pretty, but I just lose interest very quickly, if that makes sense.”

“I don’t understand, but okay,” said Reggie.

“No, you’re _not_ getting it,” said Spencer.

“That’s because you’re talking like Alex,” said Reggie. “You both talk in riddles and I need the planets to align along with a goddamn solar eclipse to help me decipher what the hell you’re both saying.”

“Okay,” said Spencer. “I’m not straight, gay, or bi. I just don’t get crushes or anything like that.”

“I thought you thought you had a crush on Kyle,” said Reggie.

“And like I said, it turned out that it wasn’t a crush,” said Spencer. “I realized that I just wanted to be his close friend. Do you get it now?”

“Remember that one girl in third grade? You had a crush on her,” said Reggie.

“I got over that very quickly when I became her friend,” said Spencer.

“So, you never got a crush on anyone since then?” asked Reggie.

“No,” said Spencer. “Like I said, I can find people pretty, but I’m not attracted to them. Does that make sense?”

“Kind of,” said Reggie. “You don’t develop crushes on people even though you can find people attractive; you just don’t want to date them?”

“Exactly,” said Spencer.

“You do realize you could’ve just said all that and not send me on a goddamn scavenger hunt to figure out what you mean, right?” asked Reggie.

“Sorry, I thought it would be better to explain it the way I did,” said Spencer.

Reggie nodded, “Its okay. We got there eventually. So, why don’t you Google it?”

“I…I’m terrified of being more of a weirdo than I think I am,” said Spencer.

“I can Google it for you, if you want me to,” said Reggie.

Spencer gave him a smile, “That’ll be great, thanks.”

“No problem,” said Reggie with a smile.

“Reggie!” called a voice.

Reggie looked over his shoulder to see his friends walking up the pier.

“What?” asked Reggie confused.

“You didn’t – what the fuck?” asked Bobby, eyes wide.

Reggie was confused, “What?”

“Why do you look a rip-off of the Joker?” asked Alex.

Spencer got up.

“ _The Crow_?” Bobby asked Spencer.

Spencer nodded, “Yeah.”

“What’s going on?” asked Reggie.

“You didn’t show up for band-practice, you weren’t answering your phone, and you weren’t at home,” said Luke.

“Oh, I got side-tracked,” said Reggie. “I was just spending time with Spencer.” He shrugged, “Lost track of time.”

“Oh,” said Alex, looking at Reggie.

“Why are you wearing that?” asked Bobby, eyeing the make-up.

“It was something that we did when we were younger,” said Spencer. Granted the first time was because of reasons that he forgot, and the last two times was to cheer Reggie up.

It took Reggie two minutes to figure out what his brother was.

“You’re aromantic-asexual,” said Reggie.

“I’m _what_?” asked Spencer incredulous.

“You're aromantic-asexual,” said Reggie. “It’s the lack of romantic or sexual attraction to anyone. You’re welcome.”

“That’s a thing?” asked Spencer.

“Yeah,” said Reggie. “It’s weird, but I’m glad that you have terms to use now.”

Spencer nodded, “Yeah. Thanks for finding out what I am for me.”

“You’re welcome, but have you always thought it was weird that you didn’t feel any attraction to someone?” asked Reggie.

“No, I didn’t think anything about it, until Jason brought it up and I got to thinking about it and how weird it was,” Spencer explained.

“Jason’s an ass at times,” said Reggie.

“And he’s going to make fun of me when I tell him that I’m aromantic-asexual,” said Spencer.

“Then don’t tell him,” said Reggie.

“They’ll find out eventually,” said Spencer.

“Only when you’re ready,” said Reggie, “And don’t let them force you to come out when you’re not ready.”

“‘ _Come out?_ ’ Can I even do that when I have _no_ sexual orientation?” asked Spencer.

Reggie shrugged, “I don’t know.”

Spencer just nodded and got up to hug Reggie, “Thanks.”

Reggie hugged him back, “You’re welcome.”

* * *

Reggie has the strange feeling that Rachel didn’t like him very much when he finally meets her. She keeps giving him weird looks, but she seemed totally chill around Alex, Bobby, and Julie.

“Hey, do you know what book _The Plot Sickens_ was inspired from?” asked Rachel.

“It was from _Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors_ ,” said Reggie. “It was about the Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571.”

“Oh, what happened with that?” asked Alex.

Reggie sighed, “The plane crashed, sixteen men survived on the Andes Mountain for seventy-two days. They _reluctantly_ resorted to cannibalism. It was for survival. He made us watch the movie _Alive_ that was based off of it. That was like last year before we left to Texas.”

“And you both still got on a plane to visit your grandmother for winter break?” asked Bobby incredulous.

“It’s cheaper and quicker,” said Reggie with a shrug.

* * *

It was a few days later when Kyle showed up to the studio, holding his guitar case.

Reggie thought Kyle was cute, with his shoulder-length hair that was blond with black streaks or black with blond streaks and the most beautiful dark blue eyes that Reggie always felt fortunate to look at.

Reggie actually couldn’t remember if Kyle’s hair was actually black or blond.

“What’s up?” Reggie asked, looking at his former band mate.

“I came out as bi to my parents, and my mom is not taking it so well,” said Kyle. “My dad took it well, though. He said that my happiness is what he wants out of me.”

“So, does she not want you hanging out with your friends?” asked Reggie.

“No, I don’t think she cares, but I don’t want my mom thinking that I’m fucking all of them,” said Kyle. “Like we’re some polyamorous band or some weird shit like that. I know Jason’s parents are polyamorous, but Jesus Christ.”

“His parents divorced and Jason's dad married a man. And they’re banging,” said Reggie. “And we’re not here to discuss that, what’s up?”

“I just want to practice this song with you because I’m kind of on rocky territory with my mom, and every time I mention my friends, she gets this constipated look on her face like I told her that I went to go fuck some shady alleyway guy,” Kyle stated.

Reggie almost laughed at that. “So you came here?”

“She knows that you left the band so she doesn’t see you as anything anymore,” said Kyle.

“That’s hurtful,” said Reggie.

“Anyway, here, Spencer wrote this song,” said Kyle, handing Reggie the song.

Reggie looked it over while Kyle set up his guitar. “Can you plug in my bass?”

“Fine,” Kyle grumbled.

“Don’t get bitchy with me,” said Reggie with a smile.

Kyle flipped him off and handed Reggie the bass, while he situated his guitar.

Reggie looked over the song and the door to the studio opened and Luke walked in. He looked at Reggie and Kyle.

“What’s going on?” asked Luke.

“Kyle wanted me to help him practice a song,” said Reggie.

“Don’t you have a band to practice with?” asked Luke a little too harshly.

“They’re busy,” Kyle lied with ease.

Reggie nodded, “Spencer does have a part-time job. The amount of times that he came home a wreck from working retail…”

Luke grimaced, “That’s horrible.”

“He says it’s a total nightmare,” said Reggie. “Some Karen yelled at him because he didn’t respond to her right away. He recently had a panic attack in the break room. Let’s practice this song.”

“Okay,” said Kyle.

It took a few tries before they finally got in the intro done and Reggie started singing:

“ _Here, we’re just stuck in the spotlight,  
_ _We should make like shadows and disappear,  
_ _Silhouettes in the sunset,  
_ _Our final curtain call is drawing near._ ”

Reggie had to blink at that. This was practically the most romantic song that he ever fucking heard…coming from his brother…who was aro-ace. Whatever.

When they got to the pre-chorus, Kyle joined in:

“ _If parting is such sweet sorrow,  
_ _To hell with waiting for tomorrow,  
_ _Hand in hand like we planned as the night takes us away._

 _And I hope when they find me and you  
_ _In this tomb built for two,  
_ _They get the glory for the end of our story,  
_ _And take their fucking bows._ ”

And there it was.

He looked away from Kyle…why was he looking intensely at Kyle and looked at Luke, who was giving him a strange look. He had looked up from his songbook.

“What?” asked Reggie confused.

“Nothing,” said Luke, shaking his head.

Reggie looked back at the song and they had to restart, finally hitting the chorus.

“ _So remember us, the soon dearly departed,  
_ _And how the war our fathers started,  
_ _Sealed the fate of star-crossed enemies.  
_

 _You and I both know that death won’t matter,  
_ _Bring on the poison and the dagger,  
_ _They set the stage for tragedy._ ”

The second verse came in:

“ _Don’t scream cause the show must go on,  
_ _Though our fairy tale is ripping at the seams,  
_ _But love doesn’t have to be something that we hide behind the scenes._ ”

Kyle must’ve gotten bored or something and smacked a kiss on his cheek, then Reggie blushed and the door to the studio slammed shut and Luke was gone.

That was bewildering and Kyle just laughed.

“Dude, what the fuck?” asked Reggie looking at him.

“I’ve seen him with his girlfriend,” said Kyle. “He really shouldn’t be looking at us like that. Maybe that helped him figure some shit out.”

“So, you intentionally pissed him off?” asked Reggie.

“Come on,” said Kyle. “You’re a hot guy. And if he can’t see how great you are…then he doesn’t deserve you.”

“Who does then?” asked Reggie.

Kyle shrugged, “How the hell would I know?”

“Do you feel like that too?” asked Reggie.

Kyle nodded, “I try to tell myself that about Dylan.”

“Who’s Dylan?” asked Reggie confused.

“He’s my friend. I have a crush on him,” said Kyle. “I told him that, he said that he was flattered, but he’s straight. It’s kind of fading away.”

“But the feeling is still there?” asked Reggie.

“It’s going away,” said Kyle. “Maybe you should tell him how you feel so you can move on. That’s what I did.”

“Okay,” said Reggie. “When should I do that?”

“When you’re ready,” Kyle said.

“Thanks, man,” Reggie said.

“No problem,” replied Kyle.

* * *

“Dude.”

“What?”

“Dude.”

“What?”

“Dude.”

“ _What_ the fuck do you _want_?”

“Hi.”

“Go to hell, Spencer.”

“Sorry, Reg… Hey.”

“What now?”

“I love you.”

“Love you too, now shut the fuck up and let me do my math homework.”


	2. Let Me Know

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Oh, was it written for Kyle?” asked Luke.
> 
> “No,” stated Reggie, “It’s just a stupid song that I wrote.” He crumpled up the song and threw it in the trash, even though it kind of sickened him a little doing so, since he was kind of proud of writing it. He forced a smile, “There, out of sight, out of mind.”
> 
> \--
> 
> In which it takes Luke and Reggie a while to get their shit together and finally start dating.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The song used in this chapter is Snuff by Slipknot.
> 
> I realized that I’m going to be adding in minor characters but here’s a list of them so you won’t get confused (like I did):
> 
> 1\. Emerald  
> 2\. Topaz – Has a fourteen-year-old son named Craig, who was an accidental pregnancy from a client, who knows about him and comes by to visit.  
> 3\. Jade  
> 4\. Opal/Olivia – The aunt from the first chapter who did the Crow and clown make-up for Spencer and Reggie.  
> 5\. Sapphire – Has a seven-year-old daughter named Jennifer, who was from a previous relationship)  
> 6\. Ruby  
> 7\. Amethyst  
> 8\. April – A fifteen-year-old run away who was taken in by Esther (the grandmother), who she now lives with. Her parents agreed for Esther to raise her because it’s a stable home-life.  
> 9\. Jayden – a homeless eighteen-year-old boy

“ _Bury all your secrets in my skin,  
_ _Come away with innocence and  
_ _Leave me alone with all my sins._

 _The air around me still feels like a cage  
_ _And love is just a camouflage for what resembles rage again…_ ”

Reggie couldn’t concentrate on the song because his parents were arguing again and Kyle kept texting him. It had been a day since the incident at the studio when they were practicing _Star-Crossed Enemies_.

It wasn’t unusual for Reggie’s former band-mates to text him, but that was on occasion.

However, Kyle kept striking up conversations with him…which Reggie found weird.

He had to hold back on asking if Kyle had some kind of mental illness because that was the only way someone would actually show any romantic interest in him. But then again Kyle was a friendly guy and maybe he was just being friendly towards him and Reggie was over thinking the entire situation by mistaking Kyle’s actions as being romantically interested in him.

So, Reggie accepted Kyle’s conversations because there was a chance that Kyle was just being friendly and…maybe he kind of wanted Kyle to flirt with him…

But he couldn’t think that. Kyle was Spencer’s band-mate and best friend. That’s crossing a line. It will be weird and Spencer definitely wouldn’t approve of it.

* * *

It should’ve been easier knowing that Luke was dating Rachel, but for some weird reason it seemed like that girl practically lived at the studio know, because she was always there.

At that point the sharing a microphone stopped and it kind of hurt that Reggie couldn’t be that close to him anymore, but he knew Kyle had a point that he needed to move on, but telling Luke while he was dating someone was very selfish, so he stayed silent on the matter.

Of course when he walked up to the studio he heard his friends talking and then he heard his name being said, he thought, _fuck it_ and left to go home.

He was sitting on the couch, watching some movie when he heard a car door close and Spencer walked in, looking even more like a wreck than normal.

“I thought you weren’t getting home until four-thirty,” said Reggie.

“I got fired,” said Spencer.

“What did someone make you do?” asked Reggie, bewildered.

“I had a break-down in the break room and Joanna decided that I should take care of my mental health and drove me home,” said Spencer sitting down on the couch. He sobbed into a pillow and Reggie pet his head for a brief moment. “Stop petting me. I’m not a dog.”

Reggie started, “Well…”

“Don’t fucking say it,” said Spencer, his face still in the pillow.

Reggie was thankful for that because Spencer was definitely not a ‘cute crier’. Spencer was basically sobbing like Heather from _The Blair Witch Project_.

“To be honest, Spence, I’m surprised that you lasted this long before having a break down,” said Reggie.

“Not the first one,” said Spencer in the pillow.

“Of course it isn’t,” muttered Reggie.

“I hated it there anyway,” said Spencer. “People don’t fucking put shit back in proper places and people can’t fucking read the signs.”

Reggie felt guilty for being one of the people who don’t put things back in the proper places and told himself to start doing that.

“Hey, maybe we can visit our grandmother over winter break,” said Reggie. “It might do you some good getting out of here for like three months.”

Spencer nodded, which just looked weird because he still had his face in the pillow. “Can you please get a paper towel?”

“Sure,” said Reggie, getting up.

* * *

Rachel didn’t come around as often as she did, Reggie wondered if the two were arguing, but he wasn’t sure and chose not to ask about it. It wasn’t any of his business.

“Where’s that one guy at?” Luke asked him.

“What guy?” asked Reggie confused.

“That one guy with the black or blond hair?” asked Luke.

“How do you not know if someone has black or blond hair?” asked Alex.

“No, the way it’s dyed,” said Luke. “I can’t tell if he has black that has blond streaks or if his hair is blond with black streaks.”

“Oh, you mean Kyle?” said Reggie.

“Yeah, _him_ ,” said Luke.

Reggie shrugged, “I don’t know. He’s probably at his home or at one of his friends’ homes or hanging out with Spencer. Why?”

“He hadn’t come by since that one day,” said Luke.

Reggie felt like he was getting interrogated. He slowly said, “He really has no reason for being here. He’s Spencer’s best friend, not mine.”

“So you also stare intensely at strangers when rehearsing other people’s songs?” asked Luke.

“I was in a band with him, remember?” asked Reggie bewildered. Granted it had been three days since that weird incident but Jesus Christ.

“Lay off a little okay, Luke?” said Bobby, cutting in. “Kyle is Spencer’s best friend and by extension, he’s Reggie’s friend too. And they were in a band together, so whatever the hell happened doesn’t matter.” He did give Reggie a look that basically said, ‘we’re-going-to-have-a-nice-little-talk-after-rehearsal’.

Reggie glanced at Alex, who was definitely going to be involved in the ‘nice-little-talk’ after rehearsal.

* * *

“So what fuck are you two arguing about?” Bobby demanded as soon as Luke and Julie left.

“I’m not arguing with him,” said Reggie. “He’s the one being bitchy.”

“What is this about staring intensely into this dude’s eyes?” asked Alex.

Reggie recounted the story about Kyle coming over for help on a song that Spencer wrote that was inspired by _Romeo & Juliet_, since his band-mates were busy (which was a lie), the weird moment of intensely staring at each other, then Kyle jokingly kissing him on the cheek.

“Dude, that means he likes you,” said Bobby.

“No he doesn’t. He said that he did that because Luke was giving us some kind of look,” Reggie said. “He told me that he has a crush on someone else that he’s trying to get over.” His two friends gave him looks that essentially said ‘bitch please’. “Besides, he could be straight and just fucking around.”

“I have seen the way he looks at that one guy, I forgot his name, so there’s nothing straight about Kyle,” said Bobby.

“Nice of you to not to throw him out of the closet, by the way,” said Alex.

“Anyway, that’s all there is,” said Reggie.

Bobby and Alex looked at Reggie; he can tell that they were definitely thinking that he was an idiot.

“I’m not the one making assumptions over an interaction that you were _told_ about instead of _witnessing_ ,” Reggie pointed out and left the studio.

There was no possible way that Kyle had a crush on him. That incident was one of the few times they hung out one-on-one and Kyle liked someone else.

And if Kyle did that as some kind of backwoods way to get over his crush on Dylan…Reggie found that he didn’t mind.

Besides, even if there was pig flying chance in Hell that Luke did like guys, Reggie didn’t deserve to have Luke anyway. Luke was like music in human form and Reggie came from a shitty home-life with parents in a love-hate marriage that was mostly hate. What did he have to offer Luke anyway? He knew that if he did date Luke, he’ll just find some way to fuck it up and they would just end up hating each other.

Luke and Rachel would love each other and respect each other to the end. They wouldn’t argue at each other, like he and Luke would most likely end up doing.

But why was he thinking about what ifs? He couldn’t even destroy a relationship that doesn’t exist.

Maybe it was best for him to be single.

Song lyrics formed in his head and he took out his phone to type it out and write later.

“ _I can’t destroy what isn’t there.  
_

 _Deliver me into my fate,  
_ _If I’m alone I cannot hate.  
_ _I don’t deserve to have you._ ”

He wasn’t sure where he was going with this song, but he was enjoying writing it out. He wished that it didn’t come to him in spurts and just not all at once.

When he walked in the kitchen, he found Spencer there, stirring something in a bowl and reading a book.

“What are you making?” asked Reggie.

“Some recipe I found online,” said Spencer, not looking up from the book.

“Okay, let me help,” said Reggie and went to wash his hands.

“Thanks, dude,” said Spencer.

“What are you reading?” asked Reggie.

“ _The Diary of a Young Girl_ ,” said Spencer. “I’m going to write a song to honor her.”

Reggie wondered what Anne Frank would think about a bunch of high school students writing a metal-core song about her if she was alive. “Okay.”

Spencer put a bookmaker in the book and set it aside. He took out a folded piece of paper and unfolded it. “I already got a chorus, ‘ _I stare through the cracks of my life in slow motion, as my world crumbles down around me; I write the words that set me free._ ’”

Reggie nodded, “That’s good.”

“I’m making the others read it,” said Spencer.

“Your band is like some fucking book club,” said Reggie.

Spencer smiled, “Maybe that’s what I want.”

It was after dinner when he was trying to do some homework, Kyle texted him again. It was pretty weird that Kyle texted him at that specific time. He knew that Kyle was on rocky territory with his mother, so maybe Kyle was trying to keep it to a minimum and avoid causing arguments, but still.

Kyle asked Reggie he wanted to hang out after band practice tomorrow and Reggie agreed to it.

He hoped that Spencer didn’t find it weird for them to hang out, but like Bobby said, Kyle was Reggie’s friend, by extension, though.

* * *

Julie couldn’t hang out after band practice because she had something to do with Flynn.

“Hey, maybe we can watch _IT: Chapter Two_ ,” said Bobby.

“I watched the movie twice with Spencer,” said Reggie. “He even wrote a song that was inspired by it.”

“He did?” asked Luke.

“Yeah,” said Reggie. “It goes something like, ‘ _catch me at the big top buried underground, you know I’m not clowning around, even with a smile from ear to fucking ear, IT’s everything you know, IT’s everything you fear._ ’ It’s better if you hear the way he sings it.”

“Didn’t he write a song based off of _Carrie_?” asked Luke.

“He did. It was _Hell in the Hallways_. That was the song that we were playing when you guys walked in the bar,” Reggie explained.

“You guys had fake blood dump on you during that spoken part,” said Alex.

Reggie smiled, “That was a lot of fun.” He stopped smiling to add, “and it was a bitch to clean off my bass.”

“And it was horrifying,” said Alex, “Just seeing this fake blood drop down on you guys.”

“People in the front got hit with it,” said Reggie, “felt bad for Jason who wasn’t there.”

“Pity the guy who didn’t get fake blood dumped on him,” said Luke.

“He was so hyped for that, but he got sick,” said Reggie. “We would’ve let him perform anyway, but he was throwing up. Spencer suggested that we can put a trashcan next to him, but Jason’s step-dad said no.”

“Jason’s step-dad is a smart man,” said Alex. “And your brother was an idiot for suggesting that.”

Reggie glared at Alex and in a low voice said, “Don’t you _ever_ call my brother an idiot again.”

“Noted,” said Alex, flinching a little, because he never saw Reggie look murderous before.

Then all trace of murderer-y intent was erased from Reggie and he looked like himself once again.

To be honest, Alex wasn’t sure what he expected when he accidentally insulted Spencer in Reggie’s presence.

“So, what movie are we going to watch?” asked Luke.

Reggie braced himself for the worst, “I can’t, because I agreed to hang out with Kyle.”

Luke scowled, while Alex and Bobby gave Reggie matching smug looks. For some reason it irritated him. “Ah yes, I can’t be friends with other bisexual dudes because that just means we want in each other’s pants. With that logic, I should stop hanging out with Alex because that means I want in _his_ pants, right? In fact, I shouldn’t try making friends with other people because that clearly means I want in their pants. Thanks for thinking that I’m some kind of sex maniac when I just want friends other than _you_ people.”

Reggie told Kyle what his friends clearly thought about him. It felt nice to talk to someone else other than Spencer. He couldn’t talk to his friends about it because they were the ones who clearly thought that _low_ about him.

Kyle just seemed irritated at the implication, “So they clearly think that based off an interaction that you _told_ them about, I want to bang _you_? They sound like my mother just in teenage boy form.”

“The cheek kiss is what sold it in their mind,” said Reggie.

“Did you tell them that it was a joke?” asked Kyle.

“At this point, I doubt that they’ll believe it,” responded Reggie.

“Now what do we do to get them to get off of that idea?” asked Kyle.

“Nothing,” said Reggie. “Just act friendly towards each other. There’s no reason to egg on their stupid theory.”

Kyle looked at his phone, and muttered an agreement.

* * *

Rachel came by once again and for some reason found that her presence didn’t annoy him as much as it used to. He still got irritated, but not as much as he used to. Rachel thankfully ignored his presence.

Luke was even more handsy with her than usual, grabbing at her waist, hands, and shoulders. Rachel looked slightly irritated with that.

And for some reason, Reggie wondered if that was Luke trying to rub the fact that he has a girlfriend in his face.

Spencer was watching a movie when Reggie got home.

“ _What_ are _you_ watching?” asked Reggie when he saw that some girl was swimming in some body of water.

 _“Jaws_ ,” said Spencer.

“Oh,” said Reggie. He sat down next to him and noticed that Spencer had a songbook open and a pencil. “You’re trying to write a song?”

“Yeah,” said Spencer.

“What happened to that one song about Anne Frank?” asked Reggie.

“You mean _The People in the Attic_?” asked Spencer.

“Is that what you’re calling it?” asked Reggie.

“Yeah, and I finished it,” said Spencer.

“What are you calling this one?” asked Reggie.

“ _Rocking the Boat_ ,” said Spencer. He looked like he had an idea, “Hey, how you write this song with me? And we can perform it together?”

Reggie nodded, “Sure. Sounds like fun.”

* * *

Reggie guessed his outburst finally smacked some kind of sense into Bobby and Alex, because they stopped giving him smug looks every time he mentioned Kyle, which was rarely.

They decided to go to Kyle’s place to hang out and play Scrabble Go together. They were in Kyle’s room, which was very nice, and Kyle even had a lava lamp. A lava lamp! Reggie didn’t know why he found that cool, but he did.

So they were sitting in Kyle’s room, playing Scrabble Go together.

“My grandmother said that it was okay for Spencer and me to visit her in Texas for winter break,” Reggie said.

Kyle looked a little dejected, but he smiled and said, “That’s cool.”

“Hey, I don’t want our Aunt Vicky to be there,” said Reggie.

“What’s wrong with her?” asked Kyle.

“She told us when we were fourteen that she had three side Daves, so that she had three-fourth chance of calling out the wrong name,” said Reggie. He grimaced, but Kyle apparently found that funny, because he started laughing.

“That’s not right, it’s fucking funny,” said Kyle.

“It kind of is now that I think about it,” said Reggie. He started laughing and the both of them were just laughing. It felt good to laugh for once after a week of being heartbroken.

The door opened and Reggie turned to see Kyle’s mom standing there.

Kyle immediately sobered up and said, “What?” His voice was a little frosty.

“Nothing, just wondering what was going on in here,” said Kyle’s mom, before leaving, but she purposely left the door open.

Kyle really looked irritated.

“I take it that she’s still not okay with you being bi,” said Reggie.

“She isn’t,” said Kyle.

“She might be okay with it,” said Reggie, “In time.”

Kyle didn’t look like he believed Reggie. Reggie didn’t believe it himself, anyway.

“If it gets too much for you, you can swing by our studio,” said Reggie.

“I appreciate it, but I do have like four other friends’ homes to go to,” said Kyle. “I’ll keep it in mind, though.”

Reggie wasn’t sure how Luke would appreciate Kyle being there in the studio, but decided that Luke would have to deal with it.

“About your aunt…you said three-fourths. Was she married or something?” asked Kyle.

“Nah, she was dating some guy and he found out, and dumped her ass. I’m not sure what happened to the other Daves, though,” said Reggie.

Kyle’s mother appeared in the doorway, “Are you going to stay for dinner or…?”

“I better get going,” Reggie said. “I promised Spencer that I was going to help him write a song.”

“Oh, is it _Rocking the Boat_?” asked Kyle.

“Yeah,” said Reggie.

“Bye,” said Kyle.

Reggie wanted to kiss Kyle bye. So, he took off instead. He wasn’t sure why he had the urge to kiss Kyle. Maybe Alex and Bobby were getting to him.

* * *

It was a surprise that Kyle came by the studio for the second time. Reggie was alone with him and he wasn’t sure if his band-mates would come by.

“Is it your mother?” asked Reggie.

“Nah, I just wanted to see you,” said Kyle. His cheeks turned pink.

Reggie was actually flattered and he felt his cheeks warm up. “That’s cool. I want to see you too.”

Reggie allowed Kyle in and showed him around since he didn’t get a full look around. Kyle seemed impressed when Reggie showed him the loft.

“It’s a step up from Jason’s garage,” said Kyle.

Reggie nodded.

“That sucks,” said Reggie. “I can try to help you find a studio.”

“Its fine,” said Kyle. “We like the garage, even though it smells like car and there’s that patch of oil that everyone keeps stepping in.”

Reggie asked, “Joseph’s dad still hasn’t gotten rid of it?”

“No,” said Kyle. “Do you want to play some more Scrabble Go?”

“You can, I was thinking of playing Bitlife,” said Reggie.

They went to the couch and took out their phones. This was not the ideal date that Reggie had in mind, but as long as Kyle enjoyed the day, Reggie was fine.

“I pissed away thirteen thousand dollars trying to win the forty-two million dollar jackpot,” said Reggie. “And that money was from burglary. I think this is karma from me killing my nine-year-old little brother when I was eleven. And then killing that one guy who bumped into me while we were in juvie.”

“What is this about? What?” Kyle asked incredulously, after ten minutes of silence.

“What?” asked Reggie.

“This says ‘ _I looked at some butts_ ,’” Kyle said. “I mean I know there’s a long list of crimes that I committed, but there’s no need to be a pervert on top of it all.” He pointed at the sentence, and Reggie just busted out laughing.

Kyle busted out laughing as well.

They finally started calming down.

“You have a pretty smile,” said Kyle.

Reggie looked at him, “You have pretty eyes.” They were a nice shade of dark blue. They looked at each other. “Can I kiss you?”

“Yeah,” said Kyle.

Reggie kissed him.

It was short and sweet, that was all that Reggie could describe it as.

He pulled away first and he looked at Kyle’s reaction. Kyle slowly opened his eyes before closing them and kissed Reggie this time. Kyle added more pressure to it, and Reggie put one hand on Kyle’s shoulder and ran one hand through Kyle’s hair. Kyle had cupped Reggie’s face, and had one arm around Reggie’s waist.

It was a very weird position to be in, Reggie thought as they kissed over and over again.

He considered the idea of deepening the kiss and pulling Kyle right into his lap, but he banished the idea. This was new and he didn’t want to push Kyle into that. He wanted to take it slow.

Reggie was melting into Kyle’s arms.

Kyle was parting his lips and –

“Jesus Christ!” yelled Bobby in surprise.

They pulled away from each other. Reggie turned to see that Julie, Alex, and Luke were standing in the doorway.

“Oh, hey, guys,” said Reggie trying to sound casual, like he hadn’t been caught kissing someone who he insisted was just a friend.

Kyle looked like he wasn’t sure if he wanted to leave or hide somewhere.

“This is Kyle,” said Reggie. “Kyle, that’s Bobby, Julie, Alex, and Luke.”

Kyle nodded at them in greeting. His face was pink, most likely from embarrassment. This was one hell of a way to introduce Kyle to his friends. It also wasn’t how Reggie wanted to introduce his friends to Kyle.

Alex was looking between Reggie and Kyle bewildered.

“What’s up?” asked Reggie, looking at his friends.

Bobby was the first one to find his voice, “Luke and Julie wanted to show us a song that they wrote.”

“Oh, okay,” said Reggie.

Luke walked by Reggie and Kyle, heading to the piano, getting things ready, but Luke had some dark look on his face that Reggie couldn’t figure out. Julie gave Kyle a small smile.

Alex pulled Reggie to the side leaving Julie and Bobby to talk to Kyle.

Alex said, “I thought you weren’t dating Kyle.”

Reggie started, “We’re not—”

“Then why are you making out with him?” asked Alex.

“That’s the first time we kissed,” said Reggie.

“Does Spencer even know about you two?” asked Alex.

“He knows that we’re friends,” said Reggie. “I’ll tell him later.”

“I thought you had a crush on Luke, though,” Alex said.

Reggie stated, “Well, I obviously moved on, so…”

(Except his heart was saying, “ _no we haven’t_ ” and his brain was going, “ _shut up, softie, we’re not talking to you_.”)

“ _It took the death of hope to let him go._ ”

Reggie looked at the sentence and rewrote it:

“ _It took the death of hope to let you go_.”

* * *

Three days after getting walked in on, Spencer finally finished putting the lyrics together on _Rocking the Boat_ , a title that Reggie came up with. Oddly enough, it felt oddly great to be a part of the songwriting process. Sure Reggie wrote country music, but it was nice to be a part of songwriting.

It wasn’t to say that Luke didn’t allow help when he was writing his songs; it was just that he didn’t want Reggie’s help because Reggie was more country orientated. Besides that, Julie and Luke wrote the songs.

However, writing a song with Spencer was a lot easier than writing a song with Luke and Julie because Spencer allowed Reggie’s input. Reggie could pick out the lyrics that he tossed at Spencer made it into the song:

“ _Cause I’ve got a fish to fry that’s feeding on the weak._ ”

“ _We’re all just floating in a shallow grave_.”

“ _We’re all so starving that we’ve taken the bait_.”

“ _With sharks like you among us, we’ll need a bigger boat_.”

“ _It’s time to set the hook_.”

“Are we going to visit our grandmother for winter break?” asked Spencer.

“I guess we can give her a call,” said Reggie as he wrote some music on the paper. He finally mustered up the balls to say, “I’m dating Kyle.”

Spencer looked up at him, “I kind of figured that something was up, to be honest.”

“What? How?” asked Reggie, bewildered at how Spencer knew.

“I noticed that you were texting Kyle and your face was all red and all I could think was ‘ _Mother of god, my brother is flirting with my band-mate_ ’. And the next day I noticed that Kyle was texting you, his face was pink and all I could think was, ‘ _Mother of god, my band-mate is flirting with my brother_.’ It wasn’t that hard to figure out.” Spencer said, “Also Luke asked me how I felt about you dating my best friend.”

“So, you’re not mad?” asked Reggie.

“Not really. Shit happens,” Spencer said with a shrug.

“It’s not weird at all to you?” asked Reggie.

“It’s real fucking weird. You’re my brother and you’re dating someone who is like my brother,” said Spencer.

“Oh,” Reggie replied.

“All I want is for you to be happy for once,” said Spencer. “And if dating Kyle makes you happy, that’s fine with me. I want him to be happy too.”

“Because of his mother?” asked Reggie.

“Yeah,” said Spencer. “That’s all that matters to me. I just want you both to be happy and if that’s with each other, its fine.”

* * *

Luke had taken the “I-refuse-to-look-you-in-the-eyes” approach towards him. To be honest, Reggie wasn’t expecting Luke to get all bitchy over him dating someone.

Even Rachel was bewildered over the whole thing. Yeah, she was back at the studio almost every day once again. It was annoying seeing her there again, like he was shoving her in his face, once again. It wasn’t like he was shoving Kyle in Luke’s face.

Actually he never brought up Kyle in conversations…except once because he had to dip out on a plan because he wanted to hang out with Kyle, and he never brought Kyle around since it seemed like they didn’t like him very much. Sure Bobby, Alex, and Julie talked to Kyle and came off as friendly towards him, but Reggie had the feeling that they didn’t like him; even Kyle had the feeling that they didn’t like him.

But Reggie liked Kyle, Spencer was fine with their relationship, and that was all that mattered to Reggie.

So when he walked in the studio, Alex and Bobby stopped their telepathic communication, because he noticed that they were looking at each other and were giving each other slight nods.

It was annoying to see that, because he had a funny feeling that it had something do about him. (Maybe it wasn’t, but what the fuck does he know?)

Rachel was sitting on the piano talking to Julie and Luke looked over at him briefly.

“So, my grandmother is allowing Spencer and me to stay with her for winter break,” said Reggie.

“Oh, that’s nice,” said Rachel.

Reggie couldn’t tell if she was being sarcastic. “At least my aunt Vicky isn’t going to be there, so that’s a bonus.”

“What’s wrong with your aunt?” asked Bobby.

“She doesn’t like our other aunts,” responded Reggie.

“Are they related to your dad or your mom?” asked Luke.

Reggie glanced at Rachel and all he could say was, “Yes.”

* * *

The flight was almost three hours. It definitely gave them a lot of time to work on songs.

Or at least it gave Spencer enough time to read _Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors_ and write a song about it, because his apparently his brother wasn’t a paranoid being. Reggie was bewildered when he saw Spencer pull that book out. Reggie asked, “Why are you rereading _that_?”

“It’s funny since I’m on a plane and I’m reading about a plane crash,” said Spencer.

“Kid, you have one fucked up since of humor,” said a man that was sitting behind them.

“Thank you, he has no survival instinct,” said Reggie.

“We both know that I’m the dumb-ass that will die within the first five minutes of a horror movie because I’ll be checking out why a shrub is moving when there’s no wind,” said Spencer.

“Glad you can admit it,” replied Reggie dryly.

“And you’ll be the dumb-ass that dies after me because you’ll be seeing why the fuck I’m lying down on the ground.” Spencer added, “And then you’ll just stand screaming in horror when the killer walks up behind you and decapitates you right as they hit the title card.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” replied Reggie. “And that was way more graphic than necessary.”

“That wasn’t graphic,” said Spencer. “You _know_ I can be worse.”

“Very,” said Reggie.

* * *

The Jenga blocks feel down with a clatter and Spencer laughed.

“Goddamn it, Spencer,” said Reggie. “Why do you have to be some kind of engineering genius?”

“I do it because it irritates you,” said Spencer with a laugh.

“You’re going to have to put the Jenga blocks up,” said a flight attendant. “We’ll be landing shortly.”

“Thank you,” said Reggie grabbing at the blocks to put them back in the box.

Sometime during the flight, Spencer got bored of reading and Reggie pulled out the Jenga box that he brought with him so he can play it with his family during the holidays.

Actually, their aunts: Opal, Emerald, Sapphire, Ruby, Amethyst, Jade, and Topaz weren’t really family members, but they were his grandmother’s employees who lived with her. She worked as a madam and they were sex-workers.

They were nick-named after gems because clients showed up at the place they worked at with jewelry that was their namesake gems, as a way to ask for them. The jewelry could be real or fake, they weren’t picky.

Jennifer was Sapphire’s seven-year-old daughter who lived there, and Craig was Topaz’s fourteen-year-old son, and April, who was a fifteen-year-old girl who ran away from her home and was found trying to do sex-work for a living.

Their grandmother, Esther, found April and took her in so she didn’t live like that and live normally. However, April did go back home and made a deal with her parents: her parents will show up for dinner every night as long as she lived with Esther since it was a more stable home for her. It was a strange arrangement but April was happy living with Esther. Jennifer, April, and Craig were essentially cousins to Reggie and Spencer.

Esther was also a drug lord, or lady, who made enough money to afford a big house for her employees.

Just because she was a madam didn’t mean she didn’t love her workers, she did, hence them living with her for safety. Esther had once beaten a man with a club for mistreating Sapphire and that was the last time that man came by.

Esther was teaching April about the sex-work business and teaching Craig how to be a drug lord, so they’ll be ready when she passes away.

It was horrifying to think like that, but they had to know ahead of time.

* * *

Esther is a frail looking woman of about seventy-three. However, that was a very good disguise to keep since people underestimated elderly people.

No one thought twice about her.

So, when they got their luggage they found Esther with Jade and they went over to greet.

Esther smiled widely and hugged both of her grandsons.

Esther held Reggie’s face, and looked at him, “Reggie, you grew while you were gone.”

“Thanks,” said Reggie. He added, “I think.”

Esther turned and grabbed Spencer’s face. She frowned, “Spencer…you grew…not by much, I see.”

“Thanks Grandma,” replied Spencer dryly. He wasn’t sensitive about his height which was 5’6, but it wasn’t hard to not notice since Reggie was taller than Spencer.

(Once Reggie and Spencer had this conversation:

Reggie: “Hey, Spence? What superpower would you like to have?”

Spencer: “Being taller. What if I’m dying and there’s something that I need that’s on a top shelf? I can’t fucking reach it. And I can’t call your ass because you’ll probably be out somewhere and take like forty minutes to come back.”)

“Hi, Aunt Jade,” said Reggie giving his aunt a one-armed hug, while Spencer hugged her other side.

“Hi, boys,” said Jade with a smile.

“Let’s get going,” said Esther, “I think I saw one of my buyers with her wife.”

“Let’s go,” said Spencer quickly.

They rushed out of the airport with their luggage.

When they were in the car, Spencer texted his friends that they landed while Reggie texted his friends about the safe landing.

* * *

Jennifer was excited to see them and was bouncing as she waited on the porch. April was sitting on the porch swing, texting someone.

Reggie was happy to see her as well and when they pulled in, Reggie was already out the door, arms open to hug Jennifer. She ran to him and Reggie picked her up and spun in a circle, causing her to squeal in happiness.

April just smiled and waved at them, before going back inside.

Their aunts were in the house and were happy enough to give them hugs.

Spencer frowned, “Where’s Craig and Aunt Opal at?”

“Craig’s sending out some of Esther’s dealers and Olivia is helping him. Craig’s got to learn the business somehow,” said Aunt Topaz.

Reggie wasn’t sure how he would feel if his son was learning how to be a drug lord, but proud was not one of them. But then again, this wasn’t a healthy environment to be in.

Also, that was the first time he actually heard the name ‘Olivia’.

“Olivia?” asked Reggie confused.

“You might know her as Opal,” said Aunt Amethyst.

“Oh,” said Reggie.

He knew that his aunts picked gems as namesakes for identity reasons, but Reggie and Spencer never knew their real names, just knowing them as the gems. He wasn’t sure why they didn’t know their real names.

* * *

It was a few days later when Alex called him.

“What’s up?” asked Reggie as Jennifer tossed a purple boa around his neck.

“Luke and Rachel broke up,” said Alex in a breathless tone.

Reggie’s eyes widened, “Really? Why?”

“I’ll be right back with Spencer and the tea,” said Jennifer, leaving the room.

“Who was that?” asked Alex.

“My cousin, Jennifer,” said Reggie watching as the girl left the patio. “Now, what happened?”

Alex started, “Well, one of Spencer’s band-mates, I think the drummer…the guy that has the caution tape wristband—”

“Oh, that’s Jason,” said Reggie. “He’s the bassist.” He frowned, “What did he do?”

“He didn’t do anything,” said Alex. “Kyle—” Reggie imagined Alex’s eye twitching at the mention of Kyle’s name and rolled his eyes, “Don’t roll your eyes at me! Anyway, Kyle (I said not to roll your eyes, Reggie!) and Jason showed up to the studio, because apparently Jason found that Rachel was cheating on Luke. Jason had taken pictures as proof.”

“I get letting Luke know since it’s the right thing to do, but why would they tell you guys about it?” asked Reggie. Soul Fragment really had no loyalty towards Julie and the Phantoms, especially since Reggie left Soul Fragment for Julie and the Phantoms.

“I’m thinking that it’s because you and Spencer are brothers, so there’s probably some sort of friendliness between our bands. Or maybe it’s because you and Kyle are dating so there’s some kind of loyalty there,” said Alex.

“Maybe,” said Reggie. “I have to ask Spencer.”

“Ask me what?” asked Spencer.

He was trying to balance a tray that had a tea kettle, a bowl of sugar cubes, a cup of milk, and snacks on it. Jennifer was holding teacups.

“Bye,” said Reggie, hanging up before Alex can get another word in. “I’ll tell you later.”

Reggie did tell Spencer later, who just shrugged in response. He called Alex back to apologize for the abrupt hang up.

“Why did you do that anyway?” asked Alex.

“Well, Spencer and Jennifer came back,” said Reggie. “How did Luke take the news?”

“He refused to believe it at first, and then it took a little convincing from them to for him to finally accept the truth,” Alex explained. “Mostly I think he seemed relieved. I tried talking to him about it, but he said he wanted to be left alone. So we’re leaving him alone for right now.”

“Well he was getting cheated on, I would want some time alone too,” said Reggie.

* * *

Spencer was the one to answer the door when the doorbell rang. He looked at the eighteen-year-old boy.

“Hey, is Esther home?” asked the boy, sticking his hands in his gray hoodie (a signal that he was a drug dealer). Spencer and Reggie had seen their fair share of people of all ages (the youngest was sixteen) wearing a gray hoodie that stopped by to buy their supply of drugs to deal.

“Yeah, she’s upstairs in her study,” said Spencer letting Jayden in.

However at dinner, Jayden was there, with Esther happily announcing that Jayden was going to live with them now and made introductions for him.

“So, he’s going to be our new cousin?” Reggie asked.

“Yes,” said Esther nodding.

“Do you know how to braid?” Jennifer asked looking at Jayden.

“Yeah,” said Jayden looking confused.

“Do you like tea?” asked Jennifer.

“That depends on the kind,” said Jayden.

“We’ll get along just fine,” said Jennifer, going back to eating.

Apparently Jayden was essentially homeless after his parents threw him onto the street right on his eighteenth birthday (for reasons he refused to say) and had been dealing drugs for three years for spare money.

It was awkward trying to make conversation with their new cousin, but they managed to make him feel welcome. Granted Jayden did say that he was going to be temporarily, until he found a decent job and pay her back, but Esther declined saying that she looks after her employees. Jayden had burst into tears and Esther hugged him.

* * *

After winter break, Reggie found that the others weren’t at the studio when Reggie and Spencer got there. Reggie was glad for it, since it gave them plenty of time to try and sing _Rocking the Boat_ before they performed it.

“So, you want me to yell, ‘shark’ for at least ten seconds?” asked Reggie.

“No, for at least maybe six seconds,” said Spencer.

“That sounds more do-able,” said Reggie. “Why can’t you do it? You’re more professional at screaming.”

“How can you learn when you won’t try?” asked Spencer.

“That’s the same fucking thing I said when I was trying to teach you how to do Sudoku,” said Reggie.

“I’m not a math genius like you,” said Spencer.

“Hey, you can sing and I can do BC Calculus. We all have our talents,” said Reggie.

“Did – did you just insult your own singing abilities?” asked Spencer in confusion.

“I did,” said Reggie realizing what he said. He grabbed his bass and plugged it in.

Spencer said, “At least you stopped trying to fix the amp in the rain.”

“Damn, you got me there,” said Reggie.

It took a few more tries and a lot of nervous laughter from Reggie for trying to scream out ‘shark’, ‘underneath’, and other words. 

Spencer was patient with him, which was comforting.

“Hey, remember that time I said to you, ‘ _I was in the womb first, and just like in everything else, you came in second?_ ’” asked Reggie.

“Yes,” replied Spencer flatly.

“I’m sorry for saying that to you,” said Reggie.

“Its fine,” said Spencer. “Besides, you said much worse to me and I said way worse back at you. Now, quit stalling and let’s get singing.”

“Okay,” said Reggie, knowing that Spencer was right.

They went through it two times, before trying for a third time.

Spencer trailed off while singing, “ _Smile you son of—_ ”

Things got extremely awkward when Reggie’s friends walked in right as Reggie was yelling, “ _Bitch!_ ”

So it looked like Reggie was calling his brother ‘bitch.’

“Why are you calling your brother a bitch?” asked Alex, looking concerned.

“Its part of the song,” said Spencer looking at his phone.

“Yelling ‘bitch’ is part of the song?” asked Luke incredulous.

“The lyric is ‘ _so smile, you son of a bitch_ ’. It’s what Martin Brody said at the end of the movie before he kills the shark,” said Spencer. He looked at his phone, and groaned.

“What is it?” asked Reggie. “Did Grandma text you another shitty pun?”

“No,” said Spencer, “Jason’s in the hospital because a rib is…” He looked at his phone closely, “pressing down on a vein and his arm is turning is blue, so he’s getting the rib removed. He even sent me a picture of his arm.” He showed Reggie the photo and yeah…the arm really is turning blue.

“That’s real shitty luck,” said Reggie. “Wait, how do they know it’s a rib pressing down on a vein?”

“I have no fucking clue,” said Spencer.

“So, what are you going to do?” asked Julie.

“Maybe five hours after he gets out of surgery, show up in his hospital room and make fun of him for having one less rib,” said Spencer with a shrug. “I don’t know. Maybe get him ice-cream.”

“You said something about your aunt Vicky not liking your other aunts,” said Luke. “Why is that?”

“Our aunts: Opal, Emerald, Ruby, Amethyst, Jade, and Topaz, aren’t our aunts,” said Spencer. “They’re our grandmother’s employees, but they live with her.”

“And?” asked Alex.

“They’re sex workers,” said Spencer bluntly.

Reggie nodded, “That’s one of the reasons our dad moved us out of Texas. He didn’t want us growing up around a bunch of sex workers and refer to them as aunts.”

“Except they let you go visit your grandmother,” said Bobby.

“That’s just for winter break,” said Spencer.

“And your cousins?” asked Alex.

“Jennifer was from Aunt Sapphire’s previous relationship,” Reggie explained. “Craig was an accidental pregnancy from one of Aunt Topaz’s clients, but he comes by to spend time with Craig. April was a run-away, who Grandma found on the street, trying to be a sex-worker, and took her to her home so she didn’t live like that. April’s parents come by to visit every day, and allowed her to live with our grandmother, saying that it was more stable there than at their home. Not entirely sure what happened there. And Jayden was recently kicked out of his home at eighteen for reasons he didn’t disclose, but it’s only temporary.”

“Is Jayden a male sex worker?” asked Bobby incredulous.

“Uh, no,” said Reggie, cringing, “He’s a drug dealer.”

“And she’s letting him live there?” asked Alex.

“He’s one of her employees and she cares for her employees,” said Spencer.

“One of her employees?” asked Luke.

“She’s also a drug lord,” said Reggie.

“A Godmother if you will,” said Spencer.

“Everyone in that house will be arrested for all of that shit,” said Alex, eyes wide. “And you both will be arrested for knowing about it and not saying anything.”

“It’s been going on for twenty years, they haven’t caught on yet,” said Reggie.

“Besides, who would suspect an elderly woman to be a madam and a drug lord?” asked Spencer.

“Anyway, two of her drug dealers had been arrested and they haven’t given her up, even if it would reduce their sentences,” said Reggie.

“It’s just stunning that you guys knew of the sex works and drug dealing,” said Luke.

Reggie frowned, “What do you want us to do? Go to the police and turn our family in?”

“Family?” asked Bobby.

Reggie shrugged, “Yeah, it’s one messed up family made up of criminals, but they didn’t hurt anyone.”

“Except for that one douche fuck that Grandma beat up for assaulting Aunt Sapphire,” Spencer cut in.

Reggie groaned, “Never bring up that asshole again.”

* * *

“ _So if you love me, let me go,  
_ _And run away before I know._ ”

Kyle and Reggie hung out a bit more, once Kyle swung by and lounged on the couch while Reggie and his band rehearsed. Granted Kyle played Bitlife while at it, but he took the time to look up and smile and kiss Reggie after every song, before he went back to playing Bitlife. It hurt a little, but Kyle was in an awkward place by being around people who didn’t like him that much.

Something in his relationship with Kyle shifted. Reggie wasn’t sure what it was, but it seemed like they were pulling away from each other.

They haven’t really hung out that much and when they did, they didn’t snuggle or anything couple-y. Yeah, they kissed a few more times, but there was that really weird shift that just cropped up.

Maybe it had something to do with him going away for winter break, or maybe their relationship was just something that was for a bit of fun or something to pass time on, or maybe they were trying to move on from their crushes. Reggie found that he didn’t mind the thought.

He wasn’t sure what caused it. He thought they were going strong, Kyle even taking the time to let Luke know about Rachel cheating, despite the poor reception he got from Reggie’s friends.

Of course everything came to a head when Reggie finally asked, “Is our relationship okay?”

“I don’t know,” Kyle admitted.

“Should we like…break up?” asked Reggie. He wasn’t sure if he liked the idea of breaking up with Kyle, but maybe they just lost interest in each other.

Kyle looked like he didn’t like the idea, but he said, “I think that would be the best.”

Reggie nodded, “What do you think went wrong?”

“I don’t know. Maybe we lost interest in each other,” said Kyle. “I still think your friends don’t like me very much.”

“If Luke wasn’t being a salty bitch over me dating you, I think they would’ve liked you. You and Jason found out that Rachel was cheating on him, and they still don’t like you,” said Reggie.

Kyle chuckled a little, “I think they warmed up to me a little, but that doesn’t mean that they like me.”

“Sorry my friends don’t like you,” Reggie said.

“Sorry I couldn’t like you the way you deserve,” said Kyle.

“Did I make you happy?” asked Reggie.

“Yeah, you did.” Kyle asked, “How about me? Did I make you happy?”

“Very much,” said Reggie, “And I was getting irritated over how they didn’t like you.”

Whatever he was feeling seemed to lift off of him and for some reason, he felt…relieved. Kyle seemed to be looking less tense.

Wow.

Were they really that bad for each other?

“Thanks for…being a good boyfriend,” Reggie responded, because Kyle was a good boyfriend.

“Except for not clicking like we should have,” said Kyle.

“That too,” replied Reggie.

“Did you like me like that? Crush and everything?” asked Kyle.

“Well, that day when we practiced _Star-Crossed Enemies_ I thought you were cute, so…maybe in some way after that,” said Reggie. “Maybe afterwards…I was telling myself you flirting with me was you being friendly, but I found that I wouldn’t have minded if you were. Flirting with me, I mean. So I guess in some way I was crushing on you, but then that went away. Sorry.”

“No, it’s fine,” Kyle responded. “I think after that, the same with me.”

“I kind of wish it worked out because I like you,” said Reggie.

“But just not like _that_ ,” finished Kyle.

“Yeah,” Reggie admitted, “You’re an amazing guy.”

“You too,” said Kyle.

“I better get going,” said Reggie, standing up.

Kyle grabbed Reggie’s wrist and looked at him.

Reggie got back down and cupped Kyle’s cheek, leaned in and kissed him, one last time.

* * *

Of course Reggie was a bit upset afterwards. He wasn’t any idiot. He knew that high school romances never lasted (except for the rare occasions it did)

So, he cried a little (not the inelegant blubbering that Spencer does) when he was at the studio (thankfully alone), because he was a little bitch who did feel a little hurt afterwards. So he texted Spencer about the whole break-up thing and the door opened, and for a brief moment he wondered if Spencer developed teleportation powers because that was quick. Instead it was Luke, who seemed…concerned.

“What happened?” asked Luke. “Were you parents fighting again?”

“Nah, they switched to the ‘I-love-you’ phase of their love-hate marriage,” said Reggie. “They’ll be in that part for maybe another day before they go back to the ‘I-hate-you’ portion again for another two months.”

“What is wrong with your parents?” asked Luke.

“They’re stuck in a love-hate marriage. I’m hoping that they’ll get that divorce once Spencer and I turn eighteen. However, Spencer’s the negative one in our brotherhood and is sure that they’ll be stuck in that marriage even after we turn eighteen,” explained Reggie. “But that’s not what I’m upset about.”

“What is it?” asked Luke.

“Kyle and I broke up,” said Reggie. “It wasn’t working. We lost interest in each other.” He shrugged, “It’s fine though.”

“Even though it upset you?” asked Luke, running one finger down Reggie’s cheek, to wipe away a tear. He looked at Reggie’s phone, at the wallpaper of Reggie wearing the clown make-up and Spencer wearing _The Crow_ make-up and both flipping off the camera. “Wait…did you guys break up over _text_?”

“No, we did it person, I was telling Spencer about it,” said Reggie.

“You guys share everything with each other,” muttered Luke.

Reggie frowned, “Why wouldn’t we tell each other everything?”

“Never mind, just how do you _feel_?” asked Luke. “About it, I mean?”

Reggie was confused, “I’m glad that we tell each other things. I would like to know where he’s going you know. I would like to know what he’s doing too, like if he’s going out to eat or if he’s at one of his friends house, or if he’s out murdering someone and I need to come up with an alibi for him…”

“What?” asked Luke alarmed.

“What?” asked Reggie.

Luke shook his head, “Never mind. I mean how are you feeling about the break-up?”

Reggie shrugged, “I’m taking it okay. Like I said, we just lost interest in each other and yeah, it hurt, but we’ll be fine.”

Luke asked, “Did you love him?”

“Nah,” Reggie stated bluntly. “We dated for like a month and I was gone for most of that. That really isn’t a very good basis for falling in love with someone. Besides, he had a feeling that you guys didn’t like him very much and that probably helped ruin it.”

Luke at least had the decency to look guilty. “Sorry for that. He’s in a rival band—”

“A rival band?” asked Reggie incredulously. “Spencer’s _in_ that rival band. Should I stop talking to my brother over that? Besides, I was in Soul Fragment before I came to Julie and the Phantoms, so I wouldn’t call them a rival band.”

Luke shook his head, “You know what? I’m not going to fight you on this.” He went to sit down on the couch and started writing a song. Reggie chose on to ignore Luke since Luke was ignoring him and sat on the piano bench. He opened up a notepad app and started typing:

“ _I only wish you weren’t my friend,  
_ _Then I could hurt you in the end.  
_ _I never claimed to be a saint._ ”

Of course Spencer came in with a bag of cosmetics and Reggie happily (eagerly) put on the scary clown make-up while Spencer did _The Crow_ make-up.

Reggie was glad to pretend that Luke wasn’t there in the studio, writing in his song journal.

And when Luke looked up to see the twins standing by the piano, talking about _Rocking the Boat_ …he felt left out while they did wore that silly make-up together, but he couldn’t intrude on what was obviously brotherly cheering. It would just be rude just to intrude on something. And yeah, the first time that Luke saw Reggie in the clown make-up, he thought that Reggie looked silly…however, he still looks a little silly, but less so.

“So that song you two worked on? Are you going to perform _Rocking the Boat_ soon?” asked Luke.

“I was thinking about it, but I’m not entirely sure yet,” said Spencer, looking at Reggie.

“I’ll be fine, don’t worry,” said Reggie.

* * *

The game, _Silent Hill 2_ , opened up with James looking in the mirror and moving his hand in his face.

“Yeah, that’s what I do when I wake up and look in the mirror,” said Reggie. “I wonder if it’s me or if I’m you.”

“I can’t figure out how to fucking move this guy,” Spencer whined, “Move your ass! Now I’m looking like an idiot.”

“You say as you make James walk in a circle in the most disgusting looking restroom I have ever seen,” said Reggie.

“I’ve seen gas station restrooms that are more disgusting than that,” said Spencer as he moved James in a circle. “Actually, the restroom at The Dirty Rose is more disgusting.”

“I think we had a performance there and you're right,” said Reggie with a shudder. “‘ _I don’t have a map of this area_.’ It’s a public restroom of course you don’t.”

“I’ll be more freaked out if this guy had a map to this area,” said Spencer. “Thank god I finally figured out how to make him move.”

“Ugh, that squelching is disgusting,” said Reggie.

“Silent Hill Ranch…” said Spencer looking at the sign, “Makes sense, maybe we’re walking on ranch dressing.” In a weird accent he said, “ _I’ll take a silent hill with extra ranch._ ”

Reggie laughed, “What fucking accent was that?”

“I don’t know, but I’m glad I said it,” said Spencer.

“Let’s follow the squelching, just like in Harry Potter, except we’re not following butterflies, we’re following squelching,” said Reggie.

“My god, look at this shitty fence,” said Spencer. “I give that an F minus for that lazy work.”

“Let’s get going,” said Reggie.

Spencer found some road and started running down it.

“I love how we’re running in the road, like putting the supernatural squelching aside, that’s just asking for us to get hit by a car,” said Reggie.

“It’s Silent Hill. The only people that are in this place are us, that one graveyard chick, and the various monsters that will kill us because I have no fucking clue how to fight,” said Spencer.

After some running on the road, Reggie said, “We’re lost, might as well follow the oncoming lane.”

Spencer started singing, “ _Life is a highway and I’m going run in the oncoming lane._ ”

“A factory!” said Spencer. “We found a factory!”

“I give that fence a…D plus,” said Reggie. “It’s a bit of a step up from that F minus fence and at least it has metal on it, so it’ll be sturdy.”

“Wait, what the fuck is that?” asked Spencer. “It doesn’t have arms! We can take it.”

The Lying Figure came at Spencer, “Fuck. I don’t know how to fight it.” He opened up the map.

“Great idea,” said Reggie. “‘ _Hold on, I don’t know how to fight. Let me open up our map for instructions on fighting_.’”

“If we die, at least we’ll know that we died on Vachss Road,” said Spencer, exiting the map. He ran around the Lying Figure and started swinging what looked to be a board with a nail on it. He finally killed the Lying Figure and then started walking around the tunnel.

“Ooh, trash first aid kit,” said Spencer.

“Used needles,” said Reggie happily.

“To be honest, we found it in the parking lot of a Happy Burger, I think we shouldn’t use it,” said Spencer.

“Oh shit! Sorry, you were getting dressed. We don’t mean to be bad people, but that doesn’t mean we won’t let you win.” He knocked The Mannequin onto the ground and beat it to death.

“Why is the mannequin dressed like Mary?” asked Reggie.

“Is Mary a mannequin? Is this guy a weirdo that’s obsessed with a mannequin? Can you imagine that being a plot twist?” asked Spencer.

“It’s just some random kid,” said Reggie, looking as Laura ran off, “You little brat! I’m not against beating up a child. I’ve done it before, I’ll do it again.” He remembered how one of his Bitlife characters got arrested for beating up on his younger sibling’s bullies.

There was a muffled scream from inside the apartment building, and Reggie said, “Oh Jesus. It’s probably another person being tormented by that child. We need to put her down.”

* * *

Reggie finally finished his song, for some reason his mind settled on calling it _Snuff_ , and had moved lyrics around. He borrowed Spencer’s acoustic guitar (that was mostly used for the intro to Soul Fragment’s song, _Thank God It’s Friday_ ). Spencer was okay with Reggie borrowing it, so he went to the studio and was relieved to find that he was alone. So, he sat down on the couch and started strumming it. He finally started singing the song:

“ _Bury all your secrets in my skin,  
Come away with innocence, and leave me with my sins.  
The air around me still feels like a cage  
and love is just a camouflage for what resembles rage again…_

_So if you love me, let me go.  
And run away before I know.  
My heart is just too dark to care.  
I can't destroy what isn't there.  
Deliver me into my fate -  
If I'm alone I cannot hate  
I don't deserve to have you..._

_My smile was taken long ago  
If I can change I hope I never know  
  
I still press your letters to my lips  
And cherish them in parts of me that savor every kiss  
I couldn't face a life without your lights  
But all of that was ripped apart when you refused to fight  
  
So save your breath, I will not hear.  
I think I made it very clear.  
You couldn't hate enough to love.  
Is that supposed to be enough?  
I only wish you weren't my friend.  
Then I could hurt you in the end.  
I never claimed to be a saint...  
  
Ooh, my own was banished long ago  
It took the death of hope to let you go  
  
So break yourself against my stones  
And spit your pity in my soul  
You never needed any help  
You sold me out to save yourself  
And I won't listen to your shame  
You ran away - you're all the same  
Angels lie to keep control...  
  
Ooh, my love was punished long ago  
If you still care, don't ever let me know  
If you still care, don't ever let me know..._”

Reggie frowned after singing the song. As powerful as singing it on the acoustic was, it was missing something; maybe an electric guitar and soft drumming.

Yeah, that sounded right.

Then he heard someone coming down the ladder to the loft.

 _No! Snuff wasn’t for anyone to hear,_ Reggie thought, panicking as he fumbled the page to hide it but gave up because Luke obviously heard the entire thing when he wasn’t supposed to. No one was supposed to hear it. It was far too personal.

So he forced a smile and turned to face the person that made him write the song. He forced a smile and said, “Hey, Luke. What’s up?”

“That’s an interesting song, did Spencer write it?” asked Luke.

That upset Reggie, because of course all Luke saw him as the guy who writes cheesy country songs. So he said, “No, I did.” He picked up _Snuff_ and looked it over.

“Oh, was it written for Kyle?” asked Luke.

“No,” stated Reggie, “It’s just a stupid song that I wrote.” He crumpled up the song and threw it in the trash, even though it kind of sickened him a little doing so, since he was kind of proud of writing it. He forced a smile, “There, out of sight, out of mind.”

Now why the fuck did Luke look at like Reggie had just slapped him?

* * *

It turned out that when Reggie had gone to the bathroom, Luke actually fished it out of the trashcan, and rewrote it onto a new page, leaving it as written when Reggie threw it away.

It was a surprise when he found his band-mates in the studio, looking over a song.

“Did Luke write a new song?” asked Reggie, walking up to Bobby.

“No, he said that you did,” said Alex.

“I never gave him a song,” Reggie stated, snatching the song from Bobby and looking it over. He felt a little sick at the lyrics he wrote and glared at Luke, “Why the fuck do you have such a hard-on for this song? I told you that it was a stupid song and it shows how much of a little bitch I am that someone won’t return my feelings. I showed you were it belonged. In the trash.” He turned and left.

He didn’t know why it upset him so much because his friends thought it was good. Or rather Luke thought it was good, he just didn’t know that the song was about him. After he thought someone else wrote it.

Once again the make-up went on and Reggie explained the situation to Spencer.

“So…you’re upset over them knowing you wrote a song?” asked Spencer.

“It’s not that…they’ll be like ‘who did you the song for? Who? Who? Who?’” asked Reggie, “And I’ll get annoyed and want to tell them.”

“Then just lie,” said Spencer. “Tell them that it’s for someone else.”

“They know if I’m lying,” responded Reggie.

“Well, shit man.” Spencer said, “What the fuck do you want me to do about it?”

“I don’t know,” said Reggie. “Look up recipes on AllRecipes?”

“Well, I did find a lemon tart recipe…” Spencer started.

“Let’s get to baking,” said Reggie happily.

Reggie was mixing ingredients in a bowl when he heard a knocking on the door. Without glancing up from the recipe on the phone he stuck his fist to his side to play a round of rock-paper-scissors with Spencer.

He glanced to see what it was. “Paper covers rock, you answer the door.”

Spencer groaned and went to answer the door.

Luke was surprised to see Spencer answering the door. And he was wearing the Crow make-up again.

He really must’ve upset Reggie, since he figured that they wore make-up whenever Reggie was upset.

“Fuck you want?” asked Spencer.

“I just want to talk to Reggie,” said Luke.

Spencer had to debate it. Whatever the hell was going on between them needed to be resolved, but Spencer wasn’t sure if Reggie wanted to talk to Luke, but…

“Fine,” Spencer grumbled, “He’s in the kitchen.”

They walked in the kitchen and Reggie turned around and saw Luke.

“I think we really need to have a talk,” said Luke.

Spencer pointed behind him and exited the kitchen.

Reggie frowned at Luke, “What do you want?”

“Look, I’m sorry if I upset you over _Snuff_ ,” said Luke.

Reggie wanted to say something like, _take your apology and shove it up your ass_ , instead he said, “Okay. Is that why you came here?”

“No, I just want to know why you got upset over me knowing about it,” Luke said.

“It wasn’t meant to be showed,” Reggie replied.

“Oh,” replied Luke. “Who was it for? You must’ve had someone in mind.”

 _Maybe you should tell him how you feel so you can move on;_ Kyle’s words suddenly sprang to mind.

And maybe Kyle was right.

Reggie really needed to move on. Writing the song didn’t help, so he said, “It’s about you. I wrote it because I realized you don’t like me like that. And a small portion was sort of about Kyle, but it’s mainly about you.”

Luke was surprised, “Really?”

“Yeah,” said Reggie, feeling slightly better. “When you were dating Rachel, I started writing it on and off.”

Luke seemed upset when he asked, “Do you not want to be my friend anymore?”

“No,” said Reggie quickly. “I still want to be your friend. I wrote that when you said that you didn’t like Kyle because he’s in a rival band and I got a little mad at you. I wouldn’t take to much stock in that part.”

“And it took the death of hope to let me go?” asked Luke.

“I wrote that when I thought I moved on,” said Reggie. “It turned out that I haven’t moved on from you.” He added, “Yet.”

“Dude, I don’t want you to move on from me!” Luke exclaimed.

“I’m not going to stroke your ego,” said Reggie.

“It’s not, I like you too,” Luke stated.

Reggie stared at Luke confused. “What?”

“It’s true,” said Luke stepping up to Reggie. “It’s why I was a bit of a dick to you when you were dating Kyle.” He tried not to grimace at the thought of the discount version of him all over Reggie. “I didn’t even realize it until he kissed your cheek when you guys were singing that love song together.”

“It’s not a love song. It was inspired by _Romeo & Juliet_,” said Reggie. He added, “And Spencer wrote it.”

“Are you really going to babble at me when I’m going to try and kiss you?” asked Luke.

Reggie for a brief moment was confused and then Luke was kissing him (despite Reggie still having red lips) and it was strangely different than the kiss that he had shared with Kyle. It was hard to tell what it was that made it better. Maybe he shouldn’t compare kisses.

Then Luke pulled away and Reggie opened his eyes and almost laughed at the sight of red on Luke’s lips.

“It suits you,” Reggie said.

“I can pull it off,” said Luke, though he didn’t know what he looked like.

Reggie laughed and Luke kissed him.

(And later, Luke looked like he made out with a clown, which he kind of did with the make-up that had been on Reggie’s face.)

A bit later, when Spencer found them, he said in a low voice, “Listen here and you listen closely. If I see my brother walk in through that door again looking like he did because of you, I will happily put this knife through your chest and make sure that for you there is no sequel.”

“Spencer!” exclaimed Reggie. “Please stop referring to _Your Number’s Up_.”

Spencer looked at Reggie, “Want me to directly quote it instead?” He glared at Luke, “If you upset my brother again, I will happily put this knife through your chest because _the knife in you, brings out the life in me_.”

Luke nodded, “Noted.”

He thought that Spencer looked a little goofy (and admittedly a little attractive) with that make-up on, but now he actually looked terrifying.

And when they walked hand-in-hand in the studio, their friends shouted ‘Finally’ and ‘about time’.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't even realize how long this chapter is, but here we are.


End file.
